Wen-Tsuen Chen

2011 Taylor L. Booth Award Recipient

“For contributions to computer science education in Taiwan and worldwide, and for promoting computer networking education at all levels”

Professor Wen-Tsuen Chen is a Distinguished Chair in the Department of Computer Science at the National Tsing Hua University where he has served as department Chairman, college Dean, and the university President. He received his B.Sc. (1970) in nuclear engineering from the National Tsing Hua University, and his M.Sc. (1973) and Ph.D. (1976) in electrical engineering and computer sciences from the University of California at Berkeley.

Professor Chen joined the National Tsing Hua University in 1976 at a time when there were no ICT industries in Taiwan. He has since witnessed and contributed to its development to a powerhouse for ICT technologies and products in the world.

Professor Chen helped found the Department of Computer Science of the National Tsing Hua University and founded the College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science of the university. He has vastly expanded the capacity of the university in educating young talents for the ICT industries in Taiwan and worldwide. From 1988 for four years, Professor Chen was a science and technology advisor to the Ministry of Education and helped establish the Taiwan Academic Network (TANet), the first Internet in Taiwan, which has served as the foundation for developing public as well as commercial Internets in next two decades in Taiwan.

From 1992 to 1996, Professor Chen served as Director of the Advisory Office of Ministry of Education. He helped improve the information infrastructure of K-12 schools and initiated the computer systems, communications, and VLSI design education programs that significantly improved research infrastructure and teaching programs in universities to cultivate talents for the expanding ICT industries in Taiwan.

Professor Chen was elected as IEEE Fellow in 1994 and received the Technical Achievement Award from the IEEE Computer Society for his research accomplishments in computer networking and parallel processing in 1999. He is a Lifelong National Chair of the Ministry of Education, Taiwan.